


She used to be mine.

by Superbanana



Category: The Bletchley Circle
Genre: F/F, Pining, Unrequited Love, that first scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:55:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24776485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Superbanana/pseuds/Superbanana
Summary: Just a quick one shot for that first episode when these two meet again. Honestly the tension there is just palpable and I’m a sucker for a bit of angst.
Relationships: Susan/Millie
Comments: 3
Kudos: 17





	She used to be mine.

Millie doesn’t often think of herself as a masochist. Not anymore. Not ever really.

She takes risks. Of course she takes risks. Life without risks is simply soup without salt. Bland. Pointless. 

She’s intelligent. She’s always been intelligent and that hasn’t gone away no matter how many times they make her sign her name on papers that deny her past. No matter how many times someone tells her to stay in a box life expects her to fill.

She’s brave. Braver than many others. Her mother called her rash, her father called her flighty but that wasn’t true. They just weren’t brave enough to accept her. She didn’t care.

She’s dishonest though. She’s always been dishonest; not to herself of course, but one must ask if that ever truly counts? Bletchley simply gave her an outlet. An escape to funnel the dishonesty into honest channels as bizarre as it sounded. Code breaking in secret was most likely the closest to honest she’d ever come. 

More than an outlet though; Bletchley had given her Susan.

And then... Susan hadn’t been hers anymore. 

It was funny really. Millie had been all around the world; just as she’d always planned to do when the wretched tedium of war finished. She’d pictured so much glamour. And yet... So many years of dreaming had come to naught. 

Once Susan had arrived the plans had changed. Indelibly altered. Tickets duplicated. Day dreams expanded, the colours painted in bolder strokes in the confines of her mind. The images so much clearer than she’d ever known. It had all made so much sense. 

So logical. So Susan.

When Susan had changed her mind, when she didn’t come with Millie then it should have been a simple matter of logistics. 

If she’d had the autonomy or inclination to do so then Millie could have explained in detail to a layperson how a battalion of soldiers could be moved. Could explain the delicacies and intricacies of codes, the duplications and the substitutes that made up secrets.

But of course she could do neither of those things. She could no more explain her greatest achievements than she could explain the vast swathes of emptiness that followed when Susan chose a normal life.

Ordinary just as Millie had sworn she would never allow Susan to be.

And now Millie was even more ordinary than Susan. Poor and ordinary.

Seven years and she’d simply returned to where she’d started. Alone. Still dishonest. But with enough pride not to beg at Susans door.

She’d even stopped sending postcards half way through her trips.

Masochism might not be one of her failings but Susans had brought her close to it for years. Millie couldn’t even find it within herself to feel ashamed when the bullets of disappointment hit at every unreturned correspondence anymore.

Susan had vanished. Become a regret that Millie didn’t like to linger on.

Millie had a job of sorts, she had a flat that she could almost afford. She didn’t think about Susan any more than she could help it.

Almost cured.

And then Susan had knocked on Millies door.

“Susan who?” She’d had to ask of course. Although she knew it was true, she’d still had to ask.

And it really had been her. Standing at Millies door like she’d never left. A ghost in a smart outfit and a pale face that didn’t see enough sun.

Bloody hell hadn’t been strong enough of a phrase.

The shock was thick and sharp and too much. It left a buzzing in her ears as she watched Susan mumble awkward hellos, awkward everythings really. She’d forgotten how awkward Susan could be.

And then, somehow, they were seated in the tea house opposite Millies flat and Susan was really there. She was so close Millie could hold her hand. Could stroke her face.

All those nights Millie had done just that and if she’d been told then that Susan could ever choose a life away from her she would have laughed. Utterly impossible.

Perhaps Susan was thinking the same thing. Or not. It was always hard to see into her thoughts. They flew too fast. “You stopped sending the postcards.” Her mouth opens as she sips her tea. Too polite to point out the cheap stale taste of old leaves.

“What was the point, you weren’t coming.” The jagged edge to her voice is too raw and Millie clamps down hard to the seat with one hand. Daring Susan to say something, to push her further. It seems to early in their reunion to start an argument but Millies waited too many years and the resentment is more present than she’d anticipated.

The tea room is a dive. The cut of Susans coat is too expensive. She doesn’t fit in here. Their lives had diverged more than Millie could believe. It feels insulting, uncomfortable and Millie wishes it wasn’t. She’s curious too. It’s all too apparent that Susan wants something from her but she’s not foolish enough to think that the thing Susan came for is her.

They stare at one another across the distance between them. It seems wider than it should be. Seven years in length to be exact.

“The last place was from Africa, where else did you go?” Susans face crinkles in interest, her sharp eyes tracing Millies face carefully.

Millie bites her lip and doesn’t give the answer she wants to. It would be too cruel. “All the places we talked about.” She doesn’t want to give too many details. She knows so little about Susans life after Bletchley, it’s only fair she return the favour.

“Was it how we thought?” Susans voice is light, gliding through the treacle thick atmosphere.

“The big adventure you mean? Hmm, yes, yes it was. Until the money ran out. It wasn’t such an adventure after that.” She took a sip of her tea. It tasted bitter but not as bitter as the next question. The obvious one that Susan had not been so well mannered enough to offer to answer without being asked. Milly shouldn’t be surprised. She’s not the only liar in this room. “So what’s his name?”

To ask hurt more than she could have dreamed. It made it real and the room tinged red at the corners.

“Timothy. He works for the department of transport.” Bland facts, basic information. Behind her eyes Susan looked like she was screaming, perhaps she would be except that Susan never screamed. She was too polite to do anything as undignified as make a noise when she’s suffering. She’s too polite to say that she’s miserable.

Or at least that’s what Milly hopes. Just a little.

Susan’s always been a tightly wound coil of dignified energy, that brilliant mind constantly turning circles, seeking patterns and order in a chaotic world. To Millie, Susan had always carried an unspoken threat that one day the coil might unload at once. The thought had used to scare Millie. 

Until Millie had seen Susan without her dignity. Until she’d been the one to set Susan free, even if it had been for just a few hours at a time.

She wondered if this Timothy had ever seen Susan unrestrained. If he really knew what she looked like with her eyes flashing, the stiff dignity banished when she gave in to her own needs. 

She wondered if he knew what she tasted like.

Millie didn’t want to think about it. But she did.

Because she did know and she hoped he didn’t. She hoped Susan stayed as frigid and buttoned up and dignified as the perfect housewife she wasn’t really when she was with her perfect little husband.

“He’s nice actually, you’d like him.’ Susans voice has the faintest tinge of desperation now. She covers it well, she’d always been the better liar but Millie knows her too well. Even now. 

Millie can’t meet her eye. Can’t look at Susans face now. It’s harder than she would have imagined to do this. Even after so much time to wish it would happen.

“I think he might get a promotion.” Susans voice is lower, dull. Her words don’t mean anything. To either of them. They just fill the silence and stop all the words they’re not saying. Or can’t say. Or won’t say.

Take your pick.

Except Millie has never been able to be ordinary and this mousy woman sitting opposite her is an insult to them both. 

How dare Susan even try to lie to Millie.

“So you met Timothy and you fell pregnant. There you go. You’re own big adventure.” The words are sour, the anger burning so brightly it should leave the table charred between them.

This time Susan looks away, biting her lip. Frustrated but unable to know what to say to that.

Who would? How many times did one seek out a secret lover for a chat over cheap tea.

There isn’t any logic for what they became to one another. Millie can understand how difficult that must be for Susan. She lived in straight lines and order.

Perhaps they should have known how it would end. Perhaps Millie should have been more careful. Less brave.

“Yes, we have a girl and a boy. Claire and Sam. You?” Susans voice has barbs, she speaks quickly. Protecting her children from Millie like she’s dangerous somehow. Like she doesn’t want Millie in her life.

The clear dismissal leaves Millie cold. She’d cry if she knew how to anymore. “No, no.” The idea of Millie marrying a chap, creating a family is laughable. 

She’s a liar. But she’s never been cruel.

Not like Susan.

Susans eyes soften at the admission, as though she pities Millie and the silence drags out between them again.

Millie tries to fill it because she wants to run away and she wants not to ever have to leave. It’s a dangerous contradiction. Illogical.

“That must keep you busy.” Millie almost smiles at the absurdity of the situation, who would have thought the two of them would one day sit and discuss the banalities of motherhood. As if motherhood could ever be enough to fill Susans brain.

“Yes it does rather.’ Susan lies briskly, ‘balancing the books, making the meat last the week, keeping the house clean... Cooking.”

As Susan speaks Millie can feel her face crumbling. She’d wanted to be angry at Susan for leaving her and she was, is, in many ways she always will be, but this? This sad, predictable life that Susan told her about? It was wrong. Such a waste.

Suddenly Millie wants to leave. She wants to run as far as she can away from Susan and her ordinary depressing life. 

“Why are you here Susan?”

Susans face seems lost for a moment, her eyes fixed on something Millie couldn’t see.

And then Susans leans forward. Her face suddenly bright, animated for the first time. Truly alive. Millie froze. Recognising the same face Susan had made when she’d cracked a fiendish cypher all those years ago. The hairs on the back of Millies neck stood on end. Electrified.

“I need your help to stop a murderer.”


End file.
